“Who said I’m crying? I’m not crying. I just want to know where I’m being hauled off to before you kill me. I would’ve liked to say good-bye to my son. Speaking of! Why isn’t he in the car with us?”
“Did you really want him to be bored while I drove up and down the freeway for an hour? Besides, you heard him, he asked to stay with Mom and Dad.”
With a defeated sigh, I mumbled, “No.”
But honestly? Even though I loved my family for whatever they had planned for my twenty-third birthday, I just wanted to be in my apartment with Parker. It was nothing against my family . . . I just didn’t want to do much of anything lately. Each day seemed harder than the last to function. To get myself out of bed. To go to work. The only thing that drove me to do anything was Parker. Even with tonight, I’d known we would be going out to celebrate, but Erica had taken one look at me and shoved me back in my apartment before doing my hair and makeup, and making me change. Saying I had to at least look like I was excited to be celebrating. Its not like I’d been in sweats . . . actually, yeah, I had.
All I wanted was to make it through another night so I could crawl into bed and finally give in to the ache of not having Coen there, not having his arms wrapped around me, and knowing he wouldn’t be there in the morning to wake up Parker with me.
I tried telling myself I’d made the right decision in not letting him back into our lives, but when Austin had left me, I’d gotten stronger every day without him. I felt like I was slowly dying without Coen. After a month of constant calling, his calls had stopped a week and a half ago; and while a part of me was glad for it, the rest was terrified that I would never hear from him again. And I didn’t know what was making it worse. That it was my decision. That I knew it was still killing Parker to not have Coen there. Or that I’d purposefully hurt Coen to the point where I’d hoped he would want to stay away.
So, no, I didn’t want to be kidnapped. I didn’t want to be separated from my son. I wanted to be home with him acting like there wasn’t a huge piece of us missing.
The car stopped and I straightened when I heard the gears shift to park. “Are we here?” I grabbed for the blindfold, and my arms were smacked away again.
“You have to keep it on until we’re inside,” Erica chastised.
“Is that necessary?”
“Yes!” they both hissed, and I jerked back.
“Got it. Sorry.”
I let Erica help me out of the car and waited until she grabbed my hand to lead me into the restaurant.
“Parker’s already here?”
“Your guy is waiting for you,” she said patiently. “There’s a tiny step up right in front of you.”
I stepped up and my brow furrowed when the light behind the blindfold vanished. I knew we were inside. But it was completely silent, and it sure as hell didn’t smell like food.
“Uh . . .”
“I’ll be right back, let me help Keegan with your gift. Don’t move!”
“Erica!” I complained, and reached out into the darkness, letting my arms drop when I heard a door shut. “Seriously?”
Taking a deep breath, my body stilled and goose bumps rose on my arms as the faint scent of the building I was in registered in my mind. I knew this place. I knew that smell.
Quick flashes tortured me. Skin against skin. Perfectly placed arms and lips. Fingers slowly pulling down the zipper on my jeans. A firm hand gripping my hair. A large bed. Slow movements as I fell in love with him.
My lips barely parted and the goose bumps moved to my entire body as the flashes kept coming. Taking a step back, my hands moved to the blindfold, but stopped halfway when a song began playing throughout the space. As I ripped the blindfold off, my mouth dropped open and I hurried to cover it with my hand when I saw everything in front of me.
I was in Coen’s studio, and hanging from the ceiling were large canvases. Dozens of them. They were low enough so the canvases hung directly in front of me in two rows set across from each other at an angle.
I walked past picture after picture of Coen. Every one I’d seen the day I looked through the folder of him. They still gripped at my heart when I saw his eyes or his face covered, knowing that he was hiding his demons from the world, but that never took away from how amazing each one was.
My footsteps faltered when the pictures changed to the flashes I’d just been having. The photo shoot Coen and I had done right here in this studio was now in front of me. In each picture the chemistry between us was tangible. In each picture the passion and love that kept pulling us together was breaking my heart more and more. Tears filled my eyes before spilling over as I came upon pictures from the park of Coen and Parker, Parker and me, Coen and me together . . . and last, the three of us.
I stopped walking and looked straight ahead at the only canvas on an easel, which was situated at the end, in between the two rows. Coen was leaning in to kiss me, both of his hands cupping my cheeks; one of my hands was resting on his chest while the other held Parker close to me. Parker’s head was tilted back, looking up at us with a large smile on his face—and there, across our feet, were the words: My Peace.
A jolt went through my body when Coen’s voice came from directly behind me, and I bit down on my lip to try to stop the fresh wave of tears.
“Two and a half years ago, I was on a mission and my team was ambushed. I’d fallen through a trap and was knocked unconscious, and when I woke up, the five of us were in a small room.”